Ellen DeGeneres on JC Penney controversy: “I really want to thank everyone who is supporting me.”

Last week, an online group called One Million Moms called for a boycott of JC Penney for hiring the “openly homosexual” Ellen DeGeneres as their spokesperson.

JC Penney, which had dropped sponsorship of Ellen’s ABC sitcom in 1997 after she and her sitcom character came out, stood firmly by DeGeneres this time.

On today’s The Ellen DeGeneres Show, she talks about the controversy:

“Normally, I try not to pay attention to my haters—but this time I’d like to talk about it, because my haters are my motivators. This organization doesn’t think I should be the spokesperson because I’m gay,” Ellen said. “They wanted to get me fired, and I’m proud and happy to say that JCPenney stuck by their decision to make me their spokesperson. Which is great news for me because I also need some new crew socks. I’m really going to clean up with this discount.”

DeGeneres is grateful for the many people who had her back.

“I usually don’t talk about stuff like this on my show, but I really want to thank everyone who is supporting me,” she added. “Here are the values I stand for. I stand for honesty, equality, kindness, compassion, treating people the way you’d want to be treated and helping those in need.To me, those are traditional values. That’s what I stand for…I also believe in dance.”